The Social Democrat-led minority government has 138 of the 349 seats in the Swedish Riksdag

Imagine for a moment that a Conservative-led coalition is defeated at the general election.

It is replaced by what could loosely be called a centre-left coalition that includes the Green Party. But this new government does not have a majority in parliament. It represents only the largest minority group and survives day to day by scraping together temporary coalitions - deal by deal, issue by issue.

Then, two months in, there is a crisis. The larger opposition parties join up with a smaller, insurgent party to block the government's budget. A constitutional stand-off ensues. The centre-left prime minister with close links to the unions stuns the political establishment by calling fresh elections.

This puts the fear of God into all sides. No party wants or can afford another election campaign so soon after the last one. A deal is done between the establishment parties to break the impasse over the budget.

Incredibly, the new government agrees to implement its conservative opponent's tax and spending plans for four months. After that the government can begin implementing its own plans to raise taxes and spending.

George Osborne is trying to change the subject. For months now the national conversation has been dominated by everything the Conservatives would rather avoid: defections and by-elections, Europe and UKIP, crises in A&E, immigration and yet more immigration.

These are all issues that either favour the Conservatives' opponents or stop them talking about their chosen agenda, namely the economy.

MPs are counting down the clock to the general election, with key decisions put off until after the poll

Take a stroll around the corridors of Westminster these days and it will not take you long to pass a parade of gloomy faces: MPs rarely troubled by legislation in these dog days of an enforced five-year Parliament, hanging around with little to do but fret about the future.

Their fear is not just the personal uncertainty of an approaching general election. It is also the sense that the old political order is changing and they perhaps are being left behind.

About James

James has been walking the streets and corridors of Westminster for almost two decades. He has worked in his current role as the BBC's deputy political editor since July 2009. Before that he spent five years as chief political correspondent leading all 24-hour news coverage from Westminster.

He has presented programmes such as The Andrew Marr Show, The Westminster Hour, The World This Weekend, Broadcasting House, Daily Politics and Straight Talk.

James joined the BBC in 2003 after a spending a decade at The Times newspaper, primarily as a political correspondent in the Westminster lobby. He also worked as the paper's Brussels correspondent and assistant foreign news editor.

He has written two books, Duel: A True Story of Death and Honour and Landale's Cautionary Tales: Comic Verse for the 21st Century.

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